Thursday, October 27, 2022

Standout Chocolate - Nordic Nature Porcini 67% (bar) - Oct. 27, 2022

Chocolate of the Day

Standout Chocolate
Nordic Nature Porcini 67% (bar)
Good ++ 
Weight: .88 oz. (25 g.) / 1.76 oz. (50 g.) in total bar
Calories: 150.75 calories in 1/2 bar
Cost: $11.50 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Bar and Cocoa, online order

Welcome to Day #5 of Chocolate and Mushroom Theme Week, featuring cacao-based items blended with a range of edible, non-psychoactive fungi, including: chaga, chanterelle, cordyceps, lion's mane, porcini, reishi, shitake, and others.

Today's Nordic Nature Porcini 67% (bar) was made by Standout Chocolate (Kallered, Sweden).

The rich blend of aroma notes for this Swedish craft chocolate dark bar included: dark, sweet chocolate; cream of mushroom soup; faint nut and fruit (dark ripe berry); and almost undetectable roasted red bell pepper notes. The texture (in cool weather) was thick and creamy.

Flavor notes included robust, fruit (berry) forward dark, slightly earthy, chocolate (more like a 75% cacao chocolate than a 67%). Any mushroom notes were relegated to the back seat--other than a very faint, fleeting whisp of nutty cream soup. 

The finish of this flavorful bar was more like a dessert course, with clearer, sweet, dark berry-bright and acidic notes.

Creating this well executed bar, made with cacao produced by Oko Caribe in the Duarte Province of the Dominican Republic, must have involved a balancing act between too sweet and too dark, between showcasing the relatively bold and fruity flavors of the DR cacao and allowing some smooth and satisfying mushroom umami notes to shine through. We enjoyed the end product.

Ingredients: Organic cacao beans, organic cane sugar, organic cacao butter, organic porcini 

Allergen-related information: May contain traces of milk.

*Porcini mushrooms (Boletus edulis)--"piglets" in Italian--likely due to their plump or chubby appearance--can be found growing in countries across the Northern hemisphere (including Europe, North America), and cooler countries in the Southern Hemisphere (such as New Zealand). They grow at the base of trees in forests and at the edge of forest clearings. 

They are a bit more flavorful than common mushrooms, with a meaty texture and woodsy, earthy and slightly nutty notes; and they're used in a variety of pasta, rice and other savory dishes.


 

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